Maryland's haves and have-nots

I was doing a little reading about another dubious first for our fair state. With the passage of HB430 earlier this week, Maryland is the first state in the country to pass a so-called "living wage" statewide - at least for those who wish to do any significant amount of business with the state. At the moment, its reach is limited to those employers who work under state contracts. But, as is the case with most liberal ideas, this measure gets the camel's nose under the tent and I wouldn't be surprised if this bill isn't expanded upon in next year's session.

In reading through HB430, what I found most interesting about this soon-to-be law is the fact that the nice folks in the General Assembly let us know we deserve less on the Eastern Shore. (After all, according to William Donald Schaefer we are Maryland's outhouse, are we not?) HB430 divides the state into two "tiers"; Tier 1 being Montgomery, Prince George's, Anne Arundel, Howard, and Baltimore counties plus Baltimore City, and Tier 2 being the rest of us hicks who voted for Governor Ehrlich. Interestingly, of the five counties who supported O'Malley over Ehrlich, four are in Tier 1, and over 2/3 of O'Malley's votes were from these counties.

Now I realize that the cost of living is markedly higher in the Baltimore-DC metroplex; however, I doubt it's 33% higher as these rates suggest. The Tier 1 areas had their "living wage" set to $11.30 per hour while the rest of us get $8.50. Unfortunately, I doubt that we'll be exempted from our share of the billion-dollar plus hole that the state is going to have in next year's budget. Those gas taxes, property taxes, and (particularly) sales taxes will hit us hard on the Eastern Shore.

I suppose in one respect this could be a boon for some of us on our side of the bay. If I'm a business who deals a lot with the state, it would be quite tempting to jump just across the bridge into Queen Anne's County to save that 33% in labor costs. But the idea of an artificial "living wage" is ludicrous on its face. The wage increase those fortunate few who work for the state would get will quickly be eaten up as the taxation bite increases to pay for the state's additional costs - moreover, those of us who don't get an automatic raise every time the state feels like giving one still get hammered by the "revenue enhancements" our Democrat friends are only too happy to sponsor.

So I have an idea for the General Assembly next year - how about a "living tax" for Marylanders? Those people in the "Tier 1" areas that vote faithfully for the "D" side of the ballot can pay a taxation rate 33% more on their income dollar than us conservatives who live on the state's edges. If the average tax rate were, say, 15% this year than the tax rate in those "Tier 1" counties should go up to 20% while ours stays at 15%.

Think that will get any traction in Annapolis next year? I think it's only fair!